56 heater control valve rebuild

[Jim K.]

Has anyone had experience installing a new seal kit in an original 56 or 57 heater control valve. I recently purchased the new (2) rubber seal kit from Corvette Central and when I put it all together and tried to pull the plunger in and out, it only moves with quite a bit of force. The cable would never be able to move it easily. Also when the inner seal pushes on to the inner brass cage and is inserted into the control valve the brass cage does not maintain it's round fit into the seal. The ID sizes of these rubber seals seem to be too small. Any idea's out there on how to fix this problem ? Anybody in the hobby doing a correct rebuild on these control valves? Any help is much appreciated . Thanks, Jim

[Mike M.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

i didn't have success rebuilding mine with the corvette central kit. ended up buying a repo which passed PV recently.mike

[Jim K.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

Thanks for reply Mike. Sounds like you had the same problem with the Central kit. I may have to go the repro route myself unless someone else can come up with a fix. Best regards, Jim

[Dan D.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

I bought the kit from CC last summer, but I have not tried to put it together yet. Nice. Has any one called CC about this? Otherwise they will just go on selling them and taking our money. I will have to move this up on the priority list of things to do. -Dan-

[Jim K.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

Dan ; I called C. Central about this yesterday . I spoke with a "Mike" about the seal kit not fitting. He did not have much knowledge about the control valve or how the seals fit into it, but he was willing to take apart a valve and see what he could figure out,except he didn't have a valve in stock. I will try calling Central again next week and try to get the name and phone# of their supplier of the seals. You would think someone there might know something. If you get a chance try putting the kit in your control valve and see what happens. I will keep you posted . Jim

[Dan D.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

Hi Jim,

I think I have spoken with this "Mike" in the past about other things. Glad you are on the top of this. I will try and put mine together next week. If it does not work I will call "Mike" myself. If both of us get on his case maybe they will do something. Thanks for pointing this out to us, and doing the work to try and get it fixed. For the price they get for this thing - $26.95 for 2 lousy rubber washers - you would think that they would at least work. Let us know how you make out -Dan-

[Jim K.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

Hi Dan ; Istead of contacting Corvette Cent. about the source of their supplier for the rubber control valve seals I decided to try and work with the seals and correct the problem myself. I did have success ! The first step was to make the little brass inner cage fit the inner rubber seal. This I accomplished by carefully filing the joining sides of the cage , making the ID of my cage smaller and allowing it to fit into the seal without overlapping when pushed into the sleave of the valve. With this done the seal and cage now fits nice and snug in the sleave. Next I put in the outer seal, brass washer, and locking cap and assembled the plunger/ cable arm onto the valve. I lubricated the seal with a small amt. of oil to make the plunger slide easier. This worked OK, but when I tried working it the following day it was very hard to get the plunger to move without a lot of force. My next move was to polish the shaft of the plunger. I put the end of the plunger in the chuck of a drill press and with a small strip of 400 grit super fine (black) sandpaper at about 3500rpm polished the shaft for no more than 5 to 10 seconds . I then lubricated the outer seal with a little vasoline and inserted the plunger ass'y. It worked beautifuly. The plunger goes in and out quite easily and should be no trouble operating the valve from the dash with the heat control cable. I hope this helps you with your heat control rebuild, please contact me if you have any problems. The C. Central seals will work with a little tweaking. Good luck, best regards, Jim

[Steven N.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

Chev's of the 40's does a complete rebuild of these units.............

[Jason W.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

To get the old seals, what did you use to open it? Drag link socket?

[Jason W.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

And any pics? Trying to find out what the finish is for the arm that holds the wire.

[Adam S.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

Hi, all info I could find was that plunger was plated, looked like chrome or cad which alowed for smoother operation, I had one that had just a little plating left on it. I don't think it was altered by anyone. I read somewhere that the plunger was plated, makes sence to me. I too rebuilt a few , they worked for a few months then , well I can't repeat what I yelled out as I cursed that female dog valve.............................. I gave in & went with the one from Paragon, very nice, I still have the two originals though .......................The arm is cad plated

[Jim K.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

Hi Jason ; To get the old seals out, I used a set of 45 degree needle nose pliers to open the slotted end cap of the control valve.

[Jason W.]

Re: 56 heater control valve rebuild

Perfect. That worked. I kinda dinged it up
Trying so other methods. Will be heading to the Cali regional on oct. Need to take pics and get a judging manual